Zhang Yimou is one of China's most prolific and acclaimed film directors. His career has been a balancing act between the Chinese censors and a demanding public, which has made for a multifaceted body of movie productions.

Among his most famous works are his award-winning directorial debut Red Sorghum, Raise the Red Lantern and the international blockbusters Hero and House of the Flying Daggers.

Unravelled China’s image

Born November 14, 1951 in Xi'an, Zhang Yimou’s father was a Kuomintang soldier and his mother was a doctor. As a young boy with a disadvantageous family background in the view of the Communist Party, he was forced to leave his studies and work on farms for ten years during the Cultural Revolution (1966-1976).

In 1978 he applied to the Beijing Film Academy (BFA), which the Party had recently reopened. After initial refusals because he was five years over the regulation application age, Zhang presented an impressive portfolio of photographs and appealed to the Minister of Culture, who granted him a place in the BFA cinematography department.

After finishing his studies in 1982, Zhang and his fellow graduates formed the core of a group of filmmakers called the Fifth Generation. In the 1980s these young visionaries kicked off a new era of Chinese film history that dared to stray from the norm by unravelling the image of China they grew up knowing.

Today, Zhang Yimou is one of the most prolific, versatile and significant of the Fifth Generation directors. His movies are best known for their simplistic plots, limited dialogue and extravagant visual artistry.

From rebel to convert?

After graduation Zhang worked as a cinematographer for several inland studios. He assisted in many movies and even had an acting role in Old Well (1986), directed by Wu Tianming. For this role Zhang won the award for Best Actor at the 1987 Tokyo Film Festival.

When Zhang was invited to work for Xi'an Film Studio, he realised that he wanted to direct movies. His award-winning directorial debut, Red Sorghum (1987), was the first Fifth Generation film to draw in a domestic mass audience and it launched him and the star of the film, Gong Li, to international fame.

Gong Li also became Zhang's companion for a lengthy period of time and she has starred in many of his films. After this first great success, Zhang received international funding for the next two films Judou (1990) and Raise the Red Lantern (1991), which were both nominated for Academy Awards, and the latter also won the Silver Lion at the Venice Film Festival in 1991.

The movie trilogy, consisting of Red Sorghum, Judou and The Story of Qiu Ju, is considered to be Zhang’s masterpiece.

Realising a childhood dream

Judou and Raise the Red Lantern were acclaimed internationally but banned in China because of their social criticism and oppressive themes. When Judou was nominated for an Oscar in 1989, Chinese officials tried to have the film withdrawn because some thought the film depicted the Chinese as a race of "bandits and villains."

Bans were lifted when Zhang made a Communist Party-approved film on a contemporary theme called The Story of Qiu Ju (1992), which won the Golden Lion in 1992. Some people saw this shift from mythic and controversial issues to mass filmmaking as Zhang’s surrender to Party authorities.

However, Zhang did not see it that way, saying that he constantly seeks diversity. He feels that his first three films were too similar: “I don’t want audiences to say, ‘Ah, yes, another Zhang Yimou!’ whenever I make a film.”

Zhang says that in the 1990s a revolution of ideas was taking place and it was then that he decided to realise his childhood dream of making a martial arts movie, a genre that he had earlier considered too lowbrow and lacking in artistic value.

Hero (2002), which was written, produced and directed by Zhang, became his first wuxia-film, combining martial arts and literature. The star of the film, Jet Li, was cast because the director wanted to ensure the movie would profit from the widespread recognition that comes with a famous name.

The film became a substantial hit in Asia and Europe, as well as the highest grossing film in Chinese history. It was also nominated for an Oscar in 2003 in the foreign language category. In 2004 Zhang released his second martial arts epic House of the Flying Daggers, which was also a blockbuster in Asia and abroad.

An eye for beauty

Zhang's propensity for capturing beautiful settings on film can be traced to his youth when he developed an interest for photography. He has a talent for creating strong moods through colour and scenery that play in well with the plot of the movie.

In Hero, for example, colours play an important part of, not only setting the mood, but the storytelling. Scenes in this movie are hauntingly beautiful. All of Zhang’s films are attestations of unrivalled camera work combined with skilful visual artistry.

Zhang also has an eye for female beauty as some of his starlets have been deemed among the most beautiful women in the world. It has been said, that through Zhang's movies, Gong Li brought sensuality and eroticism to Chinese Cinema.

Numerous essays have been written on the sexual implications of Zhang's production and especially on the female characters in his works. Zhang's masterful camera skills, beautiful scenery and lovely heroines make for movie spectacles that please the eye of audiences worldwide.

Shock, seduce, and subvert

Zhang says that he tries to make his movies look good: “I must emphasise that the 'looking good' that I'm talking about is not the same as Hollywood commercial filmmaking at all. What we make are still works of art,” Zhang says.

According to Mary Farquhar, co-author of the book Cinema and Nation: China Onscreen, Chinese critics have criticised Zhang's lavish visual imagery because of its exoticism and lack of historical authenticity.

She says that, “Zhang does not claim that his films document China or its people; he creates fictional worlds through moving images that often defamiliarise, shock, seduce, and subvert. He documents desire instead, circulating themes that have long haunted the national psyche and using seductive image-ideas that marry reality, dream and nightmare.”

The director himself says that if he ever gets an entry in a textbook, he would be happy if it read: “Zhang Yimou's style is strong visual presentation in a distinctly Chinese fashion.”